Friday, March 22, 2013

After the Boycott, Organise to Defeat the Popular Front!

Robert Mugabe and Hu Jintao

The
referendum on the new constitution was held on the 16th of March 2013
with only around 40% of eligible voters, after massive inflating of the
figures , voting on the acceptability or otherwise of the draft written
by the three parties in government together with their imperialist
masters through UNDP. Over half of the eligible voters boycotted the
referenda in a clear sign of protest to the GNU and the brutal policies
of the three parties that have wrecked the lives of the ordinary poor
and using the referendum to create the political basis for further
attacks on the poor masses through brutal austerity measures demanded by
imperialism.

Of those who voted about 94% were in support of
the document with only about 5% rejecting it and the remainder filled by
protest votes and/or spoiled votes. Even on this fraudulent basis the
draft cannot be regarded as legitimate given the number of people who
one way or the other saw through the tricks of the inclusive
dictatorship and rejected the referendum farce. All the parties in the
GNU have welcomed the results as historic and now calling for the
entrenchment of constitutionalism i.e. acceptance of the culture of
capitalist domination. Those calling for a No vote have rejected the
outcome and vow to continue to oppose the constitution until a
democratic and people driven one is in place.

For us the number
of people who boycotted the process represents a latent social force in
Zimbabwe of workers and the ordinary poor who are opposed to the
policies of the current regime but with no clear solutions given the
historical domination of reformism and centrism. The popular front
regime has brought untold suffering to the people and this must end
through smashing the regime and its social basis in order to conquer the
interests of the ordinary poor. Workers, students, poor farmers, poor
resident, unemployed and the informally employed must mobilise now for a
UNITED FRONT to oppose the popular front regime that is now preparing
to launch another round of attacks on the living conditions of the poor.

In our campaign for a boycott among workers, students, poor
residents and the ordinary poor we reiterated the urgent need to launch a
UNITED FRONT to spearhead the responses of the poor and exploited
masses with the two meetings we convened endorsing the call. To that end
the RWG (Zim) will be agitating and organising for the creation of
local struggle committees in unions and struggle organisations to call
for the convening of the UNITED FRONT of struggle organisations and
individuals dedicated to the defeat of the policies being championed by
the regime and those being proffered by those intending to replace the
regime without replacing the capitalist basis. We congratulate the
ordinary people of Zimbabwe for boycotting the referendum and now call
upon them to organise to smash capitalism and its various local agents.

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red rave is the loud mouth of members of the Communist Workers' Group of Aotearoa/New Zealand, committed to building a new communist international to lead workers to the revolutionary overthrow of global capitalism. Since 2010 we have been in a Liaison Committee with the Communist Workers' Group (USA), the Revolutionary Workers' Group (Zimbabwe) and the Revolutionary Workers' Group (Brazil).